Year: 1989
Type: article
Abstract: Inception of the ProjectThis year C ornell's Modern Indonesia Project is 35 years old and its home since its founding at 102 W est A venue is soon to be dem olished-high time for an infusion of new blood in its leadership and for the retiring director to provide a brief account of its history.This last academ ic year saw the appointm ent of Benedict A nderson, Aaron L. Binenkorb Professor of International Studies in C ornell's Departm ent of Governm ent, as director of the Project and Professor Takashi Shiraishi of the Departm ent of History as its associate director.(The first associate director, John Echols, held the post until his death in 1982 w hen he was succeeded by Ben Anderson.)Their previous scholarly accom plishm ents in the field of Indonesian studies portend a revitalization of the Project.Likely also to reinvigorate it is its projected move from the decaying building it has for so long occupied on the southw estern edge of the cam pus, to new, m ore substantial and less crowded quarters dedicated to research on Southeast Asia as a whole.C ornell's M odem Indonesian Project (CMIP) was established in January 1954 on the basis of a grant from the Ford Foundation and the support of Cornell University.Succes sive grants from Ford between then and 1968 ultim ately brought its total contribution to $502,925, with Cornell providing office space as well as moral and adm inistrative back ing-with that of Lauriston Sharp, founder and director of the U niversity's Southeast Asia Program; Knight Biggerstaff, chairman of its Departm ent of Far Eastern Studies; and Deane W. Malott, its president, being most important.Early in 1953 m em bers of the Ford Foundation's Board of D irectors observed that, with the em ergence from colonial status to independence of new states in Asia, the United States found itself embarrassingly deficient in the knowledge necessary to under stand these countries.They acknow ledged that w ithin the US governm ent there were som e able officials with experience in the area but felt that in most cases views w ithin the State Departm ent had been too heavily conditioned by its having for so long been obliged to w ork through the colonial m etropoles-London, The Hague, and Parisrather than dealing with these countries directly.They thought it im portant to develop
Source: Indonesia
DOI: 10.2307/3351264
Author: George McT. Kahin
Institution: Cornell University
Language: English
Topic: Asian Studies and History
Subfield: Sociology and Political Science
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W2321867248